Government

HEATH SPRINGS – Faced with the likelihood of losing the town’s five part-time employees, the Heath Springs Town Council voted Tuesday night to give them an across-the-board 9 percent pay raise.
But hang on: that doesn’t mean the employees will be bringing home more money.
It’s to offset the 9 percent contribution that the part-time workers must start paying into the state retirement system.

VAN WYCK – The priority for Van Wyck’s first town council won’t be the nuts-and-bolts decisions about how to run the town, though those will have to be made.
It will be expediting voluntary annexations and considering involuntarily annexations to block property around the town from getting gobbled up in the Indian Land incorporation battle.
Van Wyck’s single mayoral candidate and nine town council candidates spent most of Thursday’s 90-plus minute public forum talking about annexation.

Absentee voting for the upcoming nonpartisan Heath Springs, Kershaw and Van Wyck town council races is now open.
Qualified voters may cast absentee ballots in person from 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. weekdays at the county voter registration office on the lower level of the Lancaster County Administration Building, 101 N. Main St.
To request an absentee paper ballot application by phone, call the voting office at (803) 285-2969.
The Heath Springs and Kershaw town council elections are Nov. 7.

As one legal challenge involving the Lancaster City Council ends, another might pop up in its place.
Tuesday night’s vote to approve a $6,750 payment to newly installed council member Linda Blackmon – a vote that she participated in – has raised issues under South Carolina’s ethics statute.

As Indian Land incorporation organizers pivot to a “vote yes” campaign after winning approval from a key legislative committee in Columbia last week, opponents are ramping up their efforts to persuade residents to “vote no” on the proposition.

Newly installed Lancaster City Council member Linda Blackmon broke a 3-3 tie Tuesday night as the council granted her request for $6,750 in back pay, compensating her for the nine months when a legal challenge kept her from taking office.
But her vote drew immediate scrutiny under South Carolina’s ethics statute, which says public officials must recuse themselves on any vote “that affects their own economic interests.”

Archie Parnell, who lost a close special election for the 5th Congressional District in June, will run again in 2018, he announced Monday.
The Sumter Democrat will challenge incumbent Republican Ralph Norman, who won the seat after Mick Mulvaney vacated it to become President Trump’s budget director.

Two Democrats say they are running to challenge Republican Gov. Henry McMaster when he runs in 2018.
S.C. Rep. James Smith of Columbia announced his candidacy Monday, and Charleston businessman Phil Noble will officially unveil his plans Wednesday, according to the Charleston Post and Courier. Noble will challenge Smith for the minority party’s nomination.
Besides McMaster, three Republicans have declared their candidacies – Lt. Gov. Kevin Bryant, former state agency head Catherine Templeton, and former Lt. Gov. Yancey McGill.

Newly sworn in Lancaster City Council member Linda Blackmon has requested back pay for the nine months she would have served on the council if Jackie Harris had not sued her over the 2016 election results.
Blackmon wants $6,750 in back pay, according to the agenda for Tuesday night’s city council meeting, which was set to begin after press time.
Blackmon’s request got mixed reviews Tuesday afternoon.